Free The Canal by Lee Rourke

was just standing there. I saw him. I passed him. He didn’t see me, so I followed the road. I knew it would take me back around. I knew it would take me back to him. I had been driving for about two hours, just around and around the M25. I sometimes liked to do that—eighty-ninety miles per hour and heading absolutely nowhere, just around and around, just driving along. I got off somewhere near Dartford. I found myself on Shooters Hill Road heading towards Blackheath. I circled the heath a few times, not really knowing where to go. The streets were completely deserted just off the main drag. I remember thinking it looked odd. I felt strange. It was maybe three a.m., but the reports in the media stated that he was hit sometime between one-thirty and two-thirty a.m. I saw him walking towards Wemyss Road from Paragon Place. He was walking slowly and looked like he had been drinking. The news reports said that he had been drinking with his work colleagues. Apparently he was far away from home and wasprobably trying to flag down a taxi. But he looked local to me. He looked like he belonged. Apparently he socialised with work colleagues each Thursday night … I followed along Paragon Place. He must have sensed me, as he started to quicken his pace. He didn’t look at me, not once … Not that time, anyway. I slowed alongside him, but he just stared at his feet. I crawled alongside him for about ten metres before I continued down Paragon Place and onto Wemyss Road. I immediately turned left onto Montpelier Row, continuing onto Prince of Wales Road. It was there that I decided to go back around to Paragon Place again, to see if he was still there, dawdling along. He had ventured onto Wemyss Road. I pulled up behind him and turned off all my lights … Just my stereo playing, that song,
that perfect song
 … I think I hit him at about forty miles per hour just as he stepped into the road to cross to the other side. It was perfect timing, as if it had been rehearsed many times. It was like he’d been suddenly plucked up from the ground and flung mercilessly into the night. He hit the curb head first behind me and probably died on impact. I looked at his crumpled body through my rearview mirror. My heart was beating quickly, so quickly, so frantically. I backed up the TT to get a closer look. I got out. His eyes were wide open, just staring up into the night. And that smile on his face, I’ll never forget that smile. The one thing I regret—the one thing that haunts me—is that I should never have gotten out of the TT. I should have remained inside. I should’ve remained intact … I wasn’t too bothered about the damage at the front of my car. Like I said, I knew of places where I could get that fixed … He was nothing to me, just some random human being. I just had to do it … because I could. If they find me—which
they
at some point will—I still won’t be able to answer their questions. I’ll never beable to answer them. Not the absolute. All I can say, all that I could tell them, the one thing … his eyes … as I approached him, just as he stepped out onto the road, he turned and looked directly at me. At least this is how I remember it now. He looked at me … 
into me
, you know? Just before I hit him.
Just before I hit him
.”
    “I don’t know what to say …”
    “You don’t have to say anything. I just had to tell you this … It’s funny.”
    “What is?”
    “I almost wish that I could go back … just to see …”
    “What for?”
    “To see if he was really looking at me …”
    I once looked up on the internet the most common injuries relating to hit-and-run incidents. There weren’t that many I could think of without help. The injuries were countless: traumatic brain injury, skull fractures and haematoma, along with extensive damage to hands, arms, forearms, shoulders, and wrists. Fingers are often crushed. Lower limb damage to legs, hips, knees, heels, and feet are